Albert Tucker: Albert Tucker and the Mystery of H.D. - Art Collector

H.Dearing, Approach to Princes Bridge, c.1925. Oil on canvas on cardboard, 46 x 75.cm. Courtesy: the artist and Heide Museum of Modern Art

In 1944 Albert Tucker discovered two intriguing paintings in a bicycle shop in Melbourne. Attracted by their naive artistry he set about trying to identify the painter of the unsigned works. He was told that the pictures had belonged to Professor Alfred Henry Tipper, a travelling showman and trick cyclist who was depicted in the images. Tucker traced Tipper’s last place of residence, where he found a further three paintings, two of which were signed ‘H.D’. This exhibition brings together four of the paintings that Tucker found in 1944, with twenty-six previously unexhibited works by H. D recently acquired by Heide Museum of Modern Art.